{"id":777000956,"date":"2022-12-12T12:41:34","date_gmt":"2022-12-12T15:41:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/?p=777000956"},"modified":"2026-04-23T02:07:59","modified_gmt":"2026-04-23T05:07:59","slug":"benjamin-diokno-pagcor-should-stick-to-its-regulatory-role","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/benjamin-diokno-pagcor-should-stick-to-its-regulatory-role","title":{"rendered":"Benjamin Diokno: PAGCOR should “stick to its regulatory role”"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Philippines\u2019 finance secretary continues to criticise PAGCOR’s dual commercial and regulatory functions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

The Philippines.–<\/strong> The Philippine finance secretary Benjamin E. Diokno <\/strong>has again criticised PAGCOR’s dual role as operator and regulator, saying that it should be a regulator only. PAGCOR regulates, authorises and licenses gaming in the Philippines but it also operates over 40 casinos itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Diokno said: “PAGCOR is a regulator but at the same time it operates gambling companies. That\u2019s wrong. If you\u2019re a regulator, stick to that. You cannot run gambling casinos. It\u2019s like saying that you have a central bank and yet you\u2019re also running a bank. That cannot work.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He made the remarks after the announcement of a proposal to establish a new sovereign wealth fund. The idea is that 10 per cent of PAGCOR’s gross gaming revenue be invested in the Maharlika Wealth Fund, along with investments from government financial institutions and the central bank.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Diokno had suggested in August<\/a> that PAGCOR\u2019s new leadership “should resolve the seemingly conflicting roles<\/strong> as an operator and regulator.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Governance Commission for GOCCs (GCG)<\/a> is in the process of evaluating the decoupling of the functions of the regulator. Former finance chief Carlos Dominguez<\/strong> previously raised the idea of privatising PAGCOR\u2019s gaming operations but the Duterte administration didn\u2019t go ahead with the proposal. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

PAGCOR reported net income of PHP2.16bn (US$38.8m) for the first half of the year<\/strong>, up 2,600 per cent when compared to last year<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Philippines\u2019 finance secretary continues to criticise PAGCOR’s dual commercial and regulatory functions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":176,"featured_media":777000296,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"is_press_release":false,"is_interview":false,"is_opinion":false,"focusai_summary":"The Philippine finance secretary, Benjamin E. Diokno, has reiterated his criticism of PAGCOR's dual role as both a gaming operator and regulator, advocating for its exclusive function as a regulator. This discussion follows a proposal to invest 10% of PAGCOR's GGR into the new Maharlika Wealth Fund, with the Governance Commission for GOCCs currently evaluating the functional decoupling. The article also notes PAGCOR's significant net income growth for H1.","focusai_entities":"PAGCOR, Benjamin E. Diokno, Maharlika Wealth Fund, Governance Commission for GOCCs, GCG, Carlos Dominguez, Duterte administration","focusai_location":"Philippines","focusai_target_profile":"ceo_executive (0.9), regulator (1.0), compliance_legal (0.8), operator_casino (0.9), investor_analyst (0.9), supplier_vendor (0.7), journalist_researcher (0.9)","focusai_suggestions":[{"label":"PAGCOR Decoupling Impact?","query":"What are the projected timelines and specific governance framework changes anticipated from the GCG's evaluation of PAGCOR's functional decoupling, and how might this affect existing B2C and B2B licensing structures?"},{"label":"Privatization Opportunities?","query":"Should PAGCOR's operational assets be privatized, what specific gaming verticals and geographic regions within the Philippines would present the most attractive M&A or new market entry opportunities for international operators?"}],"footnotes":""},"categories":[157,16333],"tags":[405],"class_list":["post-777000956","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business-news","category-south-east-asia-news","tag-pagcor"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/777000956","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/176"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=777000956"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/777000956\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":777000968,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/777000956\/revisions\/777000968"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/777000296"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=777000956"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=777000956"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=777000956"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}